British Triathlon are an ambitious bunch.
Their mission statement for 2019-2024 is to “develop an environment that makes Britain the world’s leading triathlon nation; enabling success and increasing participation” – and I love that!
If you’ve never done a triathlon in your life, I’d highly recommend giving it a go. You’ll find a lovely bunch of people ready and willing to help you – everyone from the coach in charge of the session, right down to the person next to you in your session who came for the first time last week.
And that’s exactly what you need to create a world leading environment… but there’s one thing that has the power to disrupt ALL of it.
Injury.
You see injuries don’t just affect the person struggling with the pain, they have a ripple effect that bleeds out across the entire structure. Here’s how:
The Athlete
Injuries have the power to ruin medal winning opportunities at the highest international level, which diminish enthusiasm from the public to get involved in the sport at grass roots level.
Injuries can also the potential achievements of an athlete. Problems at junior levels in the sport may mean that they never qualify for the senior ranks or international competition, which reduces the number of international athletes we can produce, and that in turn stifles both our standard of competition and chances of winning medals.
This also applies to athletes competing at an Age Group level, which can have a huge impact on a club’s ability to attract new members
The Club
This is where injuries can have the most devastating effect.
Our sports clubs rely on the kindness of volunteers and their love for the sport.
We find coaching gems in the parent volunteers who get into coaching just for something to do while their kids are training.
Our committee members are often made up of folks who have been involved in the sport for a long time, have built their social network around being involved in the sport and love it so much that they want to give back.
But these amazing people disappear when injuries kick in (and especially when they stick around).
When little “Jimmy” struggles with a twinge in his knee, running doesn’t seem so much fun anymore and if it’s worse when he’s on the bike, he might decide that triathlon isn’t for him. What does mummy or daddy volunteer coach do now?
They might find that they love coaching, but it might just not be practical if Jimmy isn’t training at the same time… and poof! The club loses a great coach.
When “Mary” has built her entire social network around being a triathlete, but can no longer take part because she just can’t shake a recurring hamstring problem, she might decide that being around the sport she loves but can no longer do is too stressful… and poof! That’s the club secretary gone.
The Big Picture
When these types of things happen to one or two people, it might not seem so hard to replace them, but when we multiply it across every athlete in every club across the country, suddenly it’s a bigger problem.
Our chances of winning medal at a high level decreases, which can directly influence the amount of funding available to grassroots clubs, who find and nurture the next generation of international athletes.
And it’s a vicious circle.
The less international winners we produce, the less we are likely to produce – and all this because of a few measly injuries?
But injuries don’t HAVE to be the big problem that they are.
Yes, treating injuries takes specialist knowledge, nobody is denying that, but preventing them… now that’s a different story!
Can you imagine how easily British Triathlon (or any other sporting organisation for that matter) could fulfil their goals of “enabling success and increasing participation” if every single coach had the skills to spot injuries before they became painful and knew how to make small tweaks to everyday standard exercises to make them injury prevention super moves?
It sounds like a pipe-dream doesn’t it?
But it isn’t.
I’ve created a framework of training that shows specifically how this, and much more can be achieved by coaches of all sports and of all levels of experience, without needing an ounce of injury knowledge, using a revolutionary NEW approach that I call Injury Hacking.
I’m so confident that it can make a difference to the sporting world, that I’m giving it away, for FREE, using the super common example of knee pain in my online training “The Injury Hacker’s Solution to Knee Pain“.
If you’re a coach, club or organisation that cares about reducing the impact of injury, then you can’t afford to miss this training!
Grab it now, and I’ll see you on the inside!